We talk to a lot of parents who are worried about their child falling behind in a certain subject in school. The most common subject that places fear in the hearts of parents is, of course, math. While we know that having basic math skills is important as an adult, it’s hard to explain this to children much of the time. After all, they don’t have bills so they can’t understand what it means to need to apply math in a practical way. Keeping this in mind, you may be wondering what you can do to ensure that your child doesn’t fall behind when it comes to their math skills. ACA is a top rated Gainesville Academy Childcare provider that has been serving Alachua County for over 40 years! Read more below to uncover a few of the tricks we use here, at A Child’s Academy to get our students excited about math!

Four Gainesville Academy Childcare Tips to Make Math More Fun for Your Child

Adjust Your Attitude

Your child looks up to you without a doubt. This means if you do, say, or even think something, your child is likely to notice and replicate it. If your attitude towards math is a negative one, it is very likely that your kid will mirror this attitude. Rather than saying what you truly think about math, put on a smile and get excited! Rather than saying “Math is hard” or “I always hated math,” try telling your child how much you enjoyed excelling at math when you were their age. While this may not be true of how you felt about geometry or calculus, you likely weren’t hating math that much when you were only required to add and subtract.
Switch it Up!

There are so many resources you can pull from in order to make math fun for your child. We do all kind of activities at A Child’s Academy to make math an interactive and enjoyable experience for our students, but this is made a bit more difficult when you are trying to help them at home. Luckily, there are plenty of children’s books that have themes that revolve around mathematics, such as Big Fat Hen By K.Baker and many many more. You can also find a ton of educational materials online as well. Try visiting www.education.com for a large collection on fun online games that help to improve math skills. Your child will not even realize they are learning as they are engaged in these easy and enjoyable games.
Create a Reward System

Plain and simple, children respond more when they know they can get rewards for succeeding. For example, if you are helping your child to study simple addition, make sure to offer up a trip to the movies or a stop at your local ice cream shop if they do well on their next quiz or homework assignment. Sure, you could view this as a bribe, but when it comes to kids, rewards simply tend to leave them wanting to do well, and what’s the harm in that?
Ask Your Child’s Teacher

If you are still struggling to get your child excited about math, you may want to talk to the kid’s teacher. Working together, the two of you may be able to more aptly uncover what is keeping the child from embracing math and all that it entails.